Sturgis advertiser. (Sturgis, Dakota [S.D.]) 1887-1???, 1887-10-19
The French Home and French Sentiment.

The French Home and French Sentiment
The French community is destitute
of many sentimental influences which
are very potent with us. The home,
for instance, in England and among
ourselves is a nursery of sentiment to a
degree which it certainly is not in
France right as the French are in re-
senting our absurd misconception OF
their home-life. Mother and children
are not, in France, brought into such
sympathetic and sentimental relations
The reciprocal affection is, of course,
just as sure and pulssant, but its sineNs
are rational. She does not efface her.
self SO much, and aspire to live only in
them. They are educationally and
otherwise occupied instead of develop
ing emotional precocity. There are 10
long readings winter evenings. and
none of that intimate companionship
so often productive Of what, physiolog-
ically speaking, has been SO APPLY
termed emotional prodigality." Our
society is in considerable measure
leavened by young men who, chiefly
through this prodigality, have at one
time or another contemplated entering
the ministry, and have abandonment
the notion only after the momentous
struggle which leaves lasting traces
on the sensibility. French youth
do not know what solitude
is; their only 'fcommunings" are COM
munication. They naturally have less
aptitude for the spiritual side of life
than for it's sensual and rational sides;
the tendency of materiahsm is never
far from the surface.
In fine, when the French enter the
realm of sentiment they do not seem
quite at home. They are in danger OF
becoming either fantastic or eonven-
tional. "Les deux tours de, Notre
Dame sont lie Fl de Hugo!" exclaims,
one day, Auguste Vacquerie to Jules
Claretie, and Claretie chronicles the
remark as an impressive one. Similar
extravagancies pass muster IN the
sphere of art, though only where SEN
timent is concerned. On the other
hand, though nowhere is beauty ad
mired more fanaticallY-adored more
abjectly, one may almost say--the idea
of it is often conventional enough
Expression, sentiment, do not countfoi
SO much us regularity. LIE charme
prime la beaute is French
adage, but what constitutes
charm is the real question. As the vo
cabularies disclose, a single French
word answers to "beautiful, fine
handsome. Sometimes beauty is mere
chic, cachet, style, order and move
ment in carriage. That at any rate is
matter. of fact, the great Partisan
substitute for beauty, and has doubtless
come SO by natural selection. Accord
ingly, for the most part they confine
their activities to the sphere of the in
telligence, where they are never fan
tastic and rarely perfunctory; and
they find no difficulty whatever in do
ing this, because the atmosphere OF the
intelligence is their natural element
Notice, for example, the diction Of
French acting. 1t is the sense and moi
the sentiment of the verse or prose that
is savored by the actor and the audi.
ence. The voice never caresses the
emotion evoked by the significance Of
the lines beyond the point needful fol
complete expression. The personal
feeling by which such an actor as Sal.
vini infuses warmth and glow into his
most artistic representations the boards
of the Coincide Franchise never wit.
ness. 1t is an impersona], that is to
say, purely intellectual enjoyment
that one obtains from the delicious
voice and admirable acting of Nine.
Sarah Bernhardt, when she is at hel
best, when she is most contained, when
she appeals most strongly to ths
Partisan. There is absolutely no sen
timent whatever in that quintessence
of the exquisite which has made Nine
Judic the most popular actress OF Paris
An American or Englishman, and
should suppose, fortiori, a German
is infallibly much impressed in his
early stages of French theater-going a
the absence of intensity in the love
| passages; the absence of all that kiss
ing, clasping, enfolding, rushing to
gether, gazing into the depths of eacf
others eyes-in fine, all that effort tt
| enact the unutterable which is SO char
acteristic of our stage as TO have be
come thoroughly perfunctory. Tha
this sort Of thing does not exist on tht
French stage is partly due, to be sure
to nicer sense of prepriety, which
dictates the limits of what is fit subject
for artistic representation; but mainly
| it is to be aseribed to the predominanct
Of good sense over sentiment in the
French appetite. - From "Frencf
Traits Sense and Sentiment, !" by w
C. Brownell, in Scribner's Magazine
for October.
Pigmies Living in the Heart OF Africa.